Messages - eirik

There is obviously more to suspend and resume than many of us expected. While it would be nice to have suspend and resume working including wake up of LAN, I view it more important to get the other FnFX buttons working, in particular the one so that eCS laptop users can hook their PC to a beamer and use eCS for their presentations (rather than going to their Win partitions). In addition to increasing the value of eCS for current users, this is also a nice way of reminding other computer users that there are other platforms than Win out there that do the job (at least as well as Win does).

How far are we from a workable solution. I do not know as reports vary depending on what hardware people have. For example on my Lenovo Thinkpad T410, the sound mute button works (and integrates with pmtpos2), the Fn buttons for adjusting brightness and light up the keyboard work, while volume adjustment does not work.

Users have short memories, and new users have no memory. We need to focus on functionality and why we like OS/2-eCS. Most likely, new users will cherish some of the things we like too. Compared to Win:

eCS behaves in predictable ways (it does not attempt to "think" for you, which works very bad for me the way my brain works), and gives the user more control.

eCS has a modern file system, JFS (and HPFS) that cleans up the hard drive, keeps files together

eCS boots and shuts down faster

eCS is a much more secure system -- which is increasingly important as data is more frequently used everywhere, also for matters like net-anking etc.

To stay competitive and become attractive to new users, eCS needs to:

be able to run alongside preinstalled systems, and here the new boot manager works beautifully

install easily (next to the preinstalled OS) which it does -- installation is actually far easier than for Win (at least on my PC)

support modern hardware - the ACPI project is imperative in this connection, and progress is steady - on notepads FnFX functionality is a must, and suspend/resume is highly desirable

support WiFi, BlueTooth and other "new ways" of communicating with other devices - here progress is limited, thouch the MultiMac project shows some promise

run frequently used software, where mail clients (like Thunderbird), browsers (like FireFox), and office suites (like Open Office), are most important and currently available

support Java and Flash as these are increasingly used on the WEB - here progress takes place and it looks like we soon will have solutions that are open source and hence "maintainable" as new WEB applications arrive

continue to support old software (like Lotus SmartSuite) as many older users like me have a lot of stuff stored in those software formats

improve streamlining installation of new software and its maintenance, where WarpIn in particular is excellent

On many of these "musts" there is good progress and promise, but on communicating with other devices, eCS faces vast challenges that also need to be resolved to keep old users and attract new users. New users is the ultimate key to attract funds and developers. The way to get new users is to offer better or similar services as competitors. I think this is possible -- if not I would have switched to something else, although some times my patience is tested :-)

For many users a limited fee for using eCS is not a major obstacle as long as the platform continues to develop and new software is available.

Boot continues to be fast, no FnFX functionality yet, nor any suspend/resume (in line with expectations given by development team). Temperature a bit higher than under the previous release, but adjusting settings in Local System/ACPI support/ACPI Power Mgmt brought temperature down to acceptable levels on my ThinkPad T410. Apparently not any major changes from the previous release, but I suppose there is steady progress towards FnFX and suspend/resume working. Cleaning up code is important to allow the major change. Keep up the good work!

Great job by the ACPI team, although some functionality is still not there: primarily FnFx buttons on my Lenovo T410. It now suspends properly, but the screen does not come alive (I'll post a separate msg. on the track where it belongs, but I just want to applaud the ACPI team for their progress.

Keep up the good work! More and more of us has come to realize the complexity in ACPI, but also its value in terms of making modern hardware available to eCS users.

I fully agree with Blonde Guy that the emphasis should be ongetting ACPI support to newer models -- after all that is where the market is going to be.

My old T43 ran excellent without ACPI - suspend/resume worked wonders, wired and WiFi access, in brief the works.

On my 2 years old T410 I run ACPI ver. 3.20.03. Boot time is so fast that the lack of suspend/resume does not feel like a big problem. Fixing this issue may however also be useful in terms of getting the FnFx buttons to work as they should. My reactor temperature is 62 degrees when I run on the net, and between 52 and 58 degrees when I run on battery (I've activated throttling). On the hot side, but no real danger. Throttling also extends battery time substantially, so it beats my Win7 (64).

Otherwise, the system runs wonderfully -- wired access is excellent with the E1000E driver from the MultiMac project. The most pressing issues as I see it are: WiFi (I tried with the help of others to get the Intel 4995 under GenMac mimic the Intel 6300 a/g/n/ but no success), the FnFX buttons (so I can use my eCS partition for presentations), and Java integration into FireFox (or any other useful browser).

The recent Intel e1000e-0.2.2 driver works excellent on my Thinkpad T410 :-) I do not know what happened when the 0.2.1 version failed (it could be an unfortunate sequence of eventes that temporarily made my jfs drives halt), but if there were any errors in the past version, they are now fixed. Excellent job by the MultiMac team :-) Thanks / Eirik

The system did not trap, but after 15 minutes waiting I chose to power down the system. It had then come to the e1000e driver, but stopped there.

I have checked log files, but none of those give any indication of what may have gone wrong.

As a user it is of little comfort to me if it is the driver or ring0 that kills my file system (that I was able to restore using chkdsk /f). I am a user of eCS because I like the user interface and the way the system (usually works), but I am no computer expert. Hence I am not able to offer much assistance on the error search (and I was unable to logon to the trac or find how to get a user name/password - if I spent some more time, I may have figured that out, but some times time is just not there)

the proper autocheck is in place (it checks the jfs volumes on every startup), but this time the power off was "too brutal" for that to work, necessitating a chdksk /f (which only has happened once before in conjunction with some other updates that did not work).

On the bright side,

version 0.1.8 of the Intel e10000e MultiMac driver works excellently, and boots fast in my case

the RealTek driver works in your case

As the MultiMac project matures, I am certain we will have more functional drivers, both for wired and wireless access. Hence, to MultiMac developers: Keep up the good work!

If you run a ThinkPad T410 do not install the new Multimac driver, Intel e1000e-0.2.1.zip, as boot fails, and it trashes your file system.

If you installed this driver and had the same unfortunate experience as I did, boot eCS from CD, go to management console, and run chkdsk /f on all your jfs drives. From a command line facility, revert back to your past Intel e1000 MultiMac driver (in my case version 0.1., and reboot.

Luckily, all went well and I am up and running again :-) after some "scary" minutes.

Some days ago Paul asked what WiFi drivers people were looking for in a WiFi MultiMac project. Given that many eCS users go for Lenovo Thinkpads, the Intel Centrino 6xxx series looks like a good bet. Paul remarks that this is well embedded in Mensys' plans, but just to be on the safe side :-)

After failing to get the GenMac Intel 4965 driver to work the Intel 5xxx and 6xxx series (I was involved with this attempt), the arguments for WiFi MultiMac driver become even more profound.

I agree that the the solution we are looking for is under the MultiMac umbrella. The problem for many current users of eCS on laptops is reduced functionality today from the lack of wireless on many laptops. In some cases, a quick fix may be available under the "obsolete" GenMac framework. Fixing this short term problem at minor costs may hence influence if these current eCS users remain on eCS or move to other platforms.

I therefore argue that it is important to solve short term critical problems (if easily fixable), and WiFi is such an issue (alongside Flash and Java).

Many of the other applications are nice too, but a we now have proper browsers (FireFox), a good and reliable email client (ThunderBird), a fast PDF reader (Lucide), porper office suites (Open Office and Lotus SmartSuite), efforts should be geared towards solving the critical issues:

Net access (wired and wireless)

Proper running of the system (ACPI, Fn+FX keys, etc., although the demand for suspend/resume may have been reduced by blistering fast boot on many systems with ACPI 3.19.15)

Blonde Guy is correct, it does not work. I know as I am one of those who probably have pursued this the furthest, and I am the origin of the idea of using Intel 4965 GenMac setup for the 5xxx and 6xxx Intel drivers. But I think it may still be possible to succeed:

the driver loads appropriately without error messages, and

the XWLAN signals it is operational.

I think the problem is connected to the second last line in the Lantran log (which I then also believe is causing the MAC not to be appropriately displayed/captured):

what many eCs users have been waiting for finally appears to be just around the corner. This is not a time to fight over errors made in the past, but to be happy that eCs 1.2 soon has a good replacement. That does not mean we should not learn from past mistakes (and wise choices) made, but keeping a civilized tone usually helps. Having said that, it is easy to understand the frustration among some of those who have worked much harder to make eCs 2.0 than I have (I am just a user). However, without happy users, the future of eCs looks grim.

So, what does it take for eCs to be successful? First, the 2.0 GA needs to work well. With the extensive testing taking place, I think that looks promising. Second, the JAVA issue is needs to be solved. The likelihood of that happening depends on how well the GA works. Third, an updated version of Flash is needed. Again, that depends on how well users like the new GA.

I depend on my laptop (for the last four years a Thinkpad T43) for my job, and I have so far chosen to stay with eCs. Why? Because it is more robust and reliable than any other alternative out there. For example, its WiFi far surpasses the Win alternative in functionality and openness (thaks Willibald :-) ). Admittedly, for some few applications I need to run Win in a virtual machine, but that is a cost I am willing to bear when I see the problems my colleagues using Win face. But eCs 1.2 is getting old, and my current system is quite patchy, implying that reliability and suitability to new hardware will become an issue. Hence, I really welcome a new GA.

Then time will show if users like me made a wise decision or not. Only the future will tell, and while waiting for the future we all need to make some calculated risks.